Category: Uncategorized

Trump Trade Deficit Widens to New Record

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Despite all his bluster, the “Trump Trade Deficit” widened to a new record in the third quarter of 2019.  The non-oil merchandise trade deficit hit $1.047 trillion in the third quarter of 2019, in 2012 dollars (annual rate). That’s according to PPI calculations based on new data released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis on November 27. The latest trade deficit beat the previous record set in the fourth quarter of 2018, also under Trump.

These widening trade deficits claw right at the heart of the middle of the country, where farmers and factory workers are suffering under Trump’s misguided policies.  Factory closings just keep coming: Sparta, Wisconsin; Atlanta, Ga; West Plains, Missouri. 

Trump’s trade failures give progressive presidential candidates an opportunity to run a pro-manufacturing,  pro-growth campaign.  They should be advocating policies that jumpstart a new generation of manufacturing entrepreneurs across the country. They should support local distributed manufacturing, which both creates jobs and helps the environment.  Most of all, progressives should come out squarely in favor of a Production Economy that supports America’s core values as a producer rather than a consumer.

 

 

 

 

PPI’s Ben Ritz Talks Social Security with Ric Edelman

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The Director of PPI’s Center for Funding America’s Future, Ben Ritz, joined personal-finance advisor Ric Edelman on his nationally syndicated radio show to discuss the challenges facing Social Security, their role in the 2020 election, and PPI’s proposal to strengthen the program for future generations. Listen to the interview below and read our full plan here.

Kane for The Hill: “Presidential candidates should use their platforms to elevate oral health”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

The debate over “Medicare for All” has sucked the oxygen from many other important health policy issues. Though 28 million Americans lack health insurance in the United States, there is an untold crisis of more than four times that population — 114 million Americans — without dental coverage.

Millions of Americans are suffering from decaying teeth, gum disease, and chronic pain. Yet, in the Democratic presidential debates thus far, barely a word has been spoken about this crisis. When we spend so much time talking about health care, why is oral health so easy to ignore?

Oral health affects overall health. The consequences of untreated decay and periodontal disease – slowly destructive gum infections – include increased risk of cancers, cardiovascular diseases, Alzheimer’s disease, and premature births. Yet, almost two-thirds of Medicare enrollees, a quarter of children, and 40 percent of adults under the age of 65 don’t have dental coverage.

Read the full op-ed here.

Osborne for Wall Street Journal: “The Big Lie About Charter Schools”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Democratic presidential candidates claim they take money away from public schools. That’s nonsense.

When Sen. Elizabeth Warren released her education plan, she trotted out a familiar charge against charter schools: that they “strain the resources of school districts.” To fight this supposed scourge, she promised to end federal financial support for new charter schools. And she’s not an outlier among the Democratic presidential hopefuls. Her fellow progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders had already charged, in his education plan, that charter schools’ “growth has drained funding from the public school system.”

Even Joe Biden —who served under President Obama, an enthusiastic charter supporter—has picked up the refrain. “The bottom line” on chartering, he told an American Federation of Teachers town hall, “is, it siphons off money for our public schools, which are already in enough trouble.”

To begin with, charters themselves are public schools. The only difference is that they are operated independently of district bureaucracies, with more freedom to design their programs and choose their teachers but also more accountability. If charters fail—if their students fall too far behind—they are usually closed.

Read the full op-ed here.

Bledsoe for The Hill: “Extend solar tax credits, but end costly Carter-era subsidies”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Federal solar power tax credits have been a huge American success story, creating hundreds of thousands of jobs and tens of billions of dollars a year in clean energy investment, while avoiding hundreds of millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions. But despite its remarkable growth, solar energy still only provides about 1.5 percent of U.S. electricity. Solar must grow far larger to help the U.S. reduce carbon dioxide emissions, an action urgently needed for climate protection.

Under current law, the 30 percent solar investment tax credit begins to phase down next year, then disappears altogether for residential consumers in 2022 and phases down permanently to a 10 percent credit for commercial operations.

Read the full op-ed here.

Marshall for The Hill: “‘Old World’ demons are stirring again”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Distracted by the high drama of impeachment, Americans may not be following European political developments very closely. It’s time to tune in, though, because “Old World” demons are stirring again.

In Spain’s recent election, the anti-immigrant Vox party scored dramatic gains, more than doubling its seats in the national legislature. This caught everyone’s attention, because the tidal surge of illiberal nationalism rolling across other parts of Europe until now had bypassed Spain.

Just as Donald Trump dug up ideas long thought to have been dead and buried in this country – nativism, protectionism, “America First” isolationism – the rhetoric and political demands of Europe’s extreme right contain disturbing echoes of the virulent nationalism that swept the continent during the 1920s and 1930s and plunged the world into history’s bloodiest war.

Read the full op-ed here.

Press Release: “Tressa Pankovits joins PPI’s RAS Project, Responds to Warren Anti-Charter Rhetoric”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Tressa joins the team working to modernize our education system for the knowledge economy and an ever-changing world.

 

WASHINGTON— Tressa Pankovits joins the Progressive Policy Institute as the Associate Director of the Reinventing America’s Schools Project (RAS). With more than 10 years of experience in domestic and international education policy, management, and operations, Tressa joins RAS to expand its work around school choice and a modern public school system built for the knowledge economy.

Tressa served 10 years as the Chief Operating Officer for the Vallas Group, Inc., led by esteemed education and public finance expert Paul Vallas, managing large education reform projects in the U.S., Haiti, and Chile. She is the former Chief of Staff of the national education nonprofit AVID, which provides professional development to teachers to accelerate learning and close the achievement gap.

“PPI is delighted to welcome Tressa Pankovits to our school reform team,” said PPI President Will Marshall. “With a background in law, journalism and education reform advocacy, Tressa brings a wealth of talent to PPI’s mission of ensuring that every child in America has an equal opportunity to attend a high quality public school.”

Her political career included managing state and local campaigns, and she served as Communications Director for Illinois’ first female Lieutenant Governor. As a broadcast journalist for 13 years, she won several awards for impactful reporting on social issues, including a regional Emmy.

She joins the education team led by David Osborne, working to advance the 21st century model of public education America needs to thrive in the Information Age. Tressa will focus on research, writing, and related activities, to promote public school choice, autonomy, and accountability. Just last week, Tressa responded to Elizabeth Warren’s anti-charter rhetoric in a blog post for PPI.

 

You can contact Tressa at tpankovits@ppionline.org.

 

On the Blog: If it’s Competition for the Goose, Why Not Competition for the Gander?

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Many advocates of school choice have slammed Senator Elizabeth Warren for her new education plan, released last week. We have joined them, on Twitter. But few have pointed out the inconsistency between Warren’s embrace of competition in the rest of her plan—and in many of her economic plans—and her embrace of district monopolies in public education. We thought it would be worth adding this note to what has been a full-throated and well-deserved chorus of derision for her abject capitulation to the teachers unions.

A Response to Elizabeth Warren’s Education Plan

On July 16, 2018, progressive Senator Elizabeth Warren reassured the New England Council, “I am capitalist to my bones.” Capitalism.org defines capitalism as “an economic process where men do not compete to forcibly put down others, but to raise themselves up by creating values which are potentially unlimited.” The education plan Warren released last week, “A Great Public School Education for Every Student,” dangles huge federal grants to encourage values-driven competition. Unfortunately, she does not extend this rational to public charter schools, where such leverage could be enormously constructive for low income families—the constituency she repeatedly claims she is running to represent. 

In positioning herself as the most aggressive anti-charter Democrat, Warren has declared outright war with her pledge to eliminate the federal Charter School Program (CSP), created by President Clinton, then greatly expanded by President Obama. Because most public education policy is determined at the state and local level, completely eliminating this federal program is the most drastic anti-charter statement she could make. Warren claims it necessary to stop the expansion of charters because states do not ensure that they “are subject to the same transparency requirements and safeguards as traditional public schools,” amongst other complaints. She could’ve avoided harming poor families of color—the greatest beneficiaries of charter schools—and alienating that key constituency if she had only applied the competitive methods she suggested throughout other parts of her plan. 

For example, Warren proposes awarding $100 billion in competitive “Excellence Grants” to individual schools to restore arts programs and school-based mentoring. This would create competition between schools and reward those making the best efforts. She promises to award states generous additional Title I funding−a windfall few states could resist− if they implement fairer allocation formulas at the local level and more progressive funding policies at the state level. Again, competition designed to “raise up.” She also seeks to address school segregation with a $10 billion competitive grant for states that eliminate restrictive zoning laws that lead to residential segregation—which, of course, drives school segregation.  

So, why not—unless pandering to the anti-charter teachers unions—take the same approach with the federal CSP? Why not use it to strengthen charter schooling, which fills a desperate need for low income and minority families who otherwise do not have access to quality public education? Of the nearly 3.2 million public charter school students, 68 percent are minorities, 26 percent African Americans. More than a million children are on waiting lists nationwide. In many cases, low-income parents say charter schools are their only hope to break their children out of intergenerational poverty and the high crime, high unemployment, blighted neighborhoods in which they would otherwise be trapped. When they enroll in charters, those children learn far more than if they had stayed in district schools.

Of course, not all charter schools are great schools, and those that are not can be and should be closed. On average 3.7 percent of all charter schools have been shut down each year for the past 10 years, compared to just 0.2 percent of all traditional Title I (low-income) district schools during the entire nine years that the No Child Left Behind legislation was in effect. 

The charter school model is now too woven into the fabric of the American public education system, and the demand is for seats in them is too great, for them to be eliminated, regardless of any political promises Elizabeth Warren makes. More important, as the Washington Post editorialized, “There’s nothing progressive about strangling charter schools.” So why not use competition to find solutions to the ills of which Warren complains? Create conditions for awarding federal charter school dollars. Require transparency. Tighten up the charter authorization process, so if authorizes are not closing failing schools, no school they might authorize is eligible for federal grants. Don’t handing the approval process solely to school boards, as Warren suggests; districts are among the worst authorizers, because they are too busy operating schools to oversee charters carefully. (They are also too beholden to teachers unions, who help elect their boards, to make objective decisions about opening or closing charters.) 

According to the American Center for Progress, in a rare show of bipartisan cooperation, Congress has approved increased funds for the CSP as requested by each presidential administration since 1994, topping out at $440 million in fiscal year 2019. Senator Warren, use those capitalist bones to improve the system, not kill it while it is laying golden eggs of opportunity where none existed before. You seem to recognize the value of competition. Well-regulated charter schools create competition by their very existence. 

The Next 10 Million Jobs, Part II–Retail, Ecommerce, and All that

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

This is the second in our series of posts on “The Next Ten Million Jobs,” the types of jobs being created between now and 2030, based on the latest BLS employment projections. In our first post we looked at the importance of healthcare and social assistance jobs for driving employment growth between now and 2030. In this post we consider the future of retail, ecommerce and related jobs. More particularly, is there a coming “retail apocalypse”? And can we expect a big loss of jobs in the “consumer distribution sector”–wholesale, retail, trucking, couriers and messengers, and warehousing?

The short answer: Not according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Based on our extension of the BLS projections, the number of jobs in retail drop by 1.2% between now and 2030, a net loss of 184K jobs. Wholesale jobs are anticipated to drop as well, by 118K between now and 2030.

On the other hand, our extension of the BLS projections show a gain of 294K in the total of warehousing (fulfillment centers), couriers and messengers (local delivery) and trucking. These projected job gains, focused on ecommerce, compensate almost completely for the projected job declines in retail and wholesale. The net projected change for the “consumer distribution” sector between now and 2030? -8K job, practically nothing. So while consumer distribution is not a big contribution to the next ten million jobs, it’s not a big drag either.

It’s worth noting that these projections are somewhat more pessimistic than recent reality. Based on 12-month moving averages, retail employment fell by 40K over the past year. But employment in wholesale, trucking, couriers and messengers, and warehousing rose by 234K, for a net gain of 195K consumer distribution jobs over the past year (on a 12-month moving average basis).

That’s extraordinary. Despite all the claims of job loss, the consumer distribution sector–including retail and ecommerce–is still one of the largest job creators in the economy.

Take a look at the chart below, which shows the 12-month moving average for employment in consumer distribution.

 

 

 

The Progressive Roots of Charter Schools

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Improving public education has long been a cornerstone of the Democratic platform. Because progressives understand that access to a quality education is the gateway to a better life, our decades-long struggle to promote equal rights and opportunity for all Americans has been deeply tied to our struggle to create an effective public school system.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, progressive thought leaders conceived of a new organizational model for our public schools, a system designed for the Information Age rather than the Industrial Era. In this new system, the state or local school board could grant performance contracts to groups of individuals or organizations that applied to open new public schools. These would be exempt from many of the rules and mandates that constrained district-operated schools. They would be encouraged to innovate, to create new learning models that would appeal to children bored or otherwise dissatisfied traditional public schools. If a school succeeded, its contract would be renewed. If the school failed to educate children effectively, it would be closed. Families could choose between a variety of schools, and because tax dollars would follow children to the public school of their choice, districts would lose their monopoly on taxpayer-funded education. Neighborhood schools could no longer fail students for generations; the competition from new public schools would force them to improve or close.

Today, we know these new public schools as “charter schools,” because their performance contract is called a charter. Over the past two decades, cities that have embraced chartering, such as New Orleans, Washington, D.C., Denver, Newark, and Indianapolis, have experienced profound student growth and school improvement.1 The charter formula–school-level autonomy, accountability for results, diversity of school designs, parental choice, and competition between schools—is far more effective than the centralized, bureaucratic approach that developed more than a century ago.

The charter sector has created opportunity for millions of underserved children. But teachers at charter schools tend not to unionize, so as the charter sector grows, union membership shrinks. As a result, union leaders and their allies have gone to war against charters. They claim that charters are a product of “corporate reformers,” a right-wing effort to “privatize” our public schools. These accusations are nonsense. More accurately, they are lies born of self-interest, designed to protect the jobs of mostly white, middle-class teachers and union officials, at the expense of mostly poor, minority kids.

Democrats should know better than to fall for this anti-charter propaganda. For three decades charter schools have been a progressive initiative, brought to us by reform-minded Democrats such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Unfortunately, in the age of President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos—who also support charters—it’s become far too easy for liberal policymakers, facing pressure from the teachers unions, to cut their historic ties with America’s most successful education reform. As we move into the 2020 election season, Democrats should remember the progressive roots of chartering and think twice before turning their backs on millions of children who have benefited—and could benefit in the future—from charter schools.

 

Craig for The Hill: “Can higher ed bill reauthorization close America’s skills gap?”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

House Democrats last week rolled out a sweeping proposal to transform federal higher education policy. Among the proposals included in the bill is a provision that would make community college free nationwide, an expansion of federal Pell grants, and a new set of policies to hold schools more financially accountable for the outcomes of their graduates.

The Democrats’ approach is one that reflects, and seeks to address, a troubling reality: Perhaps more than ever before in our history, too many Americans feel that the American Dream is out of reach. But as it turns out, today’s policymakers may be only perpetuating that challenge.

Read Ryan Craig’s full op-ed in The Hill by clicking here.

Why Trade Rules Matter: A Case Study on Washington State, Airplanes, Subsidies, and Trade Wars

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

This report is a case study of why global trade rules are vital to Washington State, one of America’s most trade-reliant states.

Our report explains how Washington’s economy, exporters, and workers prosper under rules-based trade, particularly the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its system for settling trade disputes. By contrast, unilateral approaches to trade—like current tariff wars— are causing significant economic harm to Washington. We recommend concrete steps that Washington’s leaders can take to support the global trade system on which the State’s prosperity depends.

Trade in airplanes—which accounts for an astounding 54 percent of Washington’s goods exports and supports hundreds of thousands of Washington jobs—is a particular focus of this report.

We begin by highlighting trade’s critical role in supporting Washington’s economy, creating opportunities for Washington businesses, and providing good jobs for Washington workers. We then explain the importance of the WTO, its rules against unfair practices like trade-distorting subsidies, and its dispute system designed to ensure that countries play by these rules. Unilateral U.S. tariffs and China’s subsidy and tech practices depart significantly from WTO rules and norms.

Our report then explores the longstanding dispute between the United States and the European Union (EU) at the WTO over subsidies for large commercial airplanes.

We highlight how a final decision by the WTO in 2018—confirming that Europe’s Airbus received more than $9 billion in WTO-illegal subsidies from EU governments that must be remedied— provided a major boost to efforts by the United States to level the global playing field in aircraft trade, to the benefit of Boeing and Washington State. (The WTO originally found that Airbus had received over $22 billion in unlawful subsidies, but later reduced that amount to $9 billion because the passage of time caused the remaining subsidies to age out.)

We note, in particular, that an October 2019 WTO arbitration award authorized the United States to impose $7.5 billion in countermeasures against the EU’s WTO-illegal aircraft subsidies, and explain how the United States has employed this authorization to impose targeted tariffs on politically sensitive EU products—like aircraft, cheese, machinery, and wine—to pressure the EU to eliminate its illegal aircraft aid.

We also detail how a March 2019 final decision in a separate WTO case has found that Boeing received $325 million in WTO-violating subsidies during the period reviewed as a result of Washington’s 2003 reduction in its Business and Occupation tax rate for manufacturers of commercial airplanes. We explain why it’s critical for Washington to revise relevant tax law to comply with the ruling in a way that maintains Washington’s competitiveness in airplane manufacturing, while also avoiding creating a new WTO-violating subsidy by ensuring that any fix is broadly applicable.

Go-it-alone tariffs, in contrast to rules-based trade, are harming Washington’s economy and the State’s manufacturers, farmers, tech firms, and workers. We explain why these actions also sow longer-term business uncertainty and fail to set precedents against emerging trade threats, such as unfair competition from China’s state- subsidized aircraft sector.

Finally, we recommend steps that Washington’s leaders can take to bolster open, rules-based trade. Most immediately, they’ll need to develop a positive, WTO-consistent fix to address the recent final ruling against Washington’s tax treatment for the aerospace sector. Additionally, Washington’s leaders should support other key trade initiatives, including reforming the WTO, reining-in abusive tariffs, expanding America’s network of trade deals, and boosting trade enforcement support for products and services that Washington exports.

 

Press Release: PPI Calls for Bolder, Innovative Initiatives to Bridge Modern Skills Gap

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

PPI Calls for Bolder, Innovative Initiatives to Bridge Modern Skills Gap

To close America’s skills gap and allow tens of millions of displaced Americans to join the dynamic economy, progressives need bolder, more innovative initiatives.

 

WASHINGTON— The Progressive Policy Institute is calling for a more aggressive approach to bridging America’s skills gap following House Democrats’ introduction of major legislation to reauthorize the landmark Higher Education Act. 

Although reauthorization is long overdue, the new legislation, called the College Affordability Act, proposes mainly marginal improvements to a  broken higher education financing system. Moreover, it doesn’t do enough to help people who don’t go to college – the majority of young Americans – acquire the skills they need to land solid, middle-class jobs that remain unfilled in abundance.

“As the College Affordability Act demonstrates, Congress is eager to grapple with Higher Education Reauthorization,” said author Ryan Craig, “but current proposals are marginal improvements on a broken system.”

The research is clear: U.S. Department of Labor statistics suggest that 7.3 million jobs remain unfilled, many of them high-paying, high-skill positions. Survey after survey reports that employers are unable to find skilled workers.

To help close America’s skills gap and allow tens of millions of alienated Americans to join the dynamic economy, progressives need bolder, more innovative initiatives. In a report released today by Ryan Craig and the Progressive Policy Institute, the research assesses conventional remedies and presents creative alternatives: a new Progressive Skills Agenda for all young people, whether or not they are college-bound. 

“Democrats can become the party of workforce development in addition to the party of college,” said Craig, “and if they can, not only will they help return economic power to their traditional working-class base, they’ll have a shot at winning back these crucial voters in 2020 and beyond.”

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Bledsoe for Medium: “Trump’s Ukraine-Gate Attacks on Biden Echo Watergate”

Posted on by The Progressive Policy Institute

Those viewing and participating in the fourth Democratic debate should ignore the spin, and cut right to the chase. Trump’s Ukraine-gate outrages are about exactly the same thing Watergate was: A corrupt President of the United States illegally attempting to destroy the Democratic presidential candidate he most fears will beat him for re-election.

Remember the famous, frustrated injunction made to Bob Woodward during Watergate by “Deepthroat”, FBI Agent Mark Felt, the original impeachment whistleblower:

“You’re missing the overall!” Felt implored Woodward. “They [the Nixon White House] were frightened of Muskie; look who got destroyed. They wanted to run against McGovern; look who they’re running against…”

The media and many in the Democratic Party, too, seem to be “missing the overall.” Trump was out to destroy Biden. Look who’s been falling in the polls. Trump hopes to run against Warren or another candidate that he views as weaker. Looks who’s gaining in the polls. Whichever of the many Democratic legitimate candidates you might support, this influence seems undeniable.

It is, in fact, a hugely troubling sign of how jaded the American polity has become — and how corrupt and amoral the Republican Party now is — that most people don’t seem to recognize the eerie similarity between what Nixon did, and Trump has done.

Read Paul Bledsoe’s full piece on Medium.